894 Bulletin 47, United States National Museum. 



1282. XIPHIAS GLADIUS, Linnaeus. 

 (COMMON SWORDFISU; ESPADA; ESPADON; EMPERADOR.) 



Head about 2i ; depth about 5$ ; snout 3 in length. D. 40-4 ; A. 18-14; 

 Vertebrae 14 -f- 12. Cleft of mouthextending beyond eye. Color dark metal- 

 lic purplish above, dusky below; "sword" almost black above, below 

 lighter; fins dark, with silvery sheen. Atlantic Ocean, on both coasts, 

 most abundant between Cuba and Cape Breton ; not rare off Cape Cod 

 and the Newfoundland Banks ; rather common in southern Europe ; also 

 found in the Pacific, occasionally taken about Santa Barbara Islands,* 

 but not elsewhere recorded from the eastern Pacific. The object of exten- 

 sive fisheries in the Atlantic, (gladius, sword.) 



Xiphias gladius, LINNAEUS, Syst. Nat., Ed. x, 248, 1758, Europe; after Xiphias, of^ARTEDi; BLOCH, 

 Ichthyologia, pi. 76, 1784; CUVIER & VALENCIENNES, Hist. Nat. Poiss., vm, 255, 1831; GflN- 

 THER, Cat., n, 511, 1860; STORER, Fishes Mass., 71, 1867; JORDAN & GILBERT, Synopsis, 420, 

 1883. 



Xiphias rondeleti, LEACH, in Wern. Mem., n, 58, pi. 2, fig. 1, 1818, Frith of Forth. 



Family CXXIV. NEMATISTIID^E. 

 (THE PAPAGALLOS.) 



Body oblong, compressed, regularly diminishing in height toward the 

 caudal; the caudal peduncle moderately reduced. Scales cycloid and 

 small, but conspicuous, arranged in moderately oblique rows above and 

 less oblique ones below. Lateral line simple and unarmed, scarcely con- 

 vex anteriorly and not angulated. Head little longer than high, com- 

 pressed and trenchant above, with the profile strongly decurved from the 

 dorsal fin to the eyes, the snout oblique. Eyes in the anterior half of the 

 head, near the snout and the profile. Nostrils double, in front of the eyes. 

 Suborbital bones low. Opercula unarmed. Mouth rather large, the cleft 

 very oblique and continued under the eyes. Teeth villiform, small, pres- 

 ent on the vomer and palatine bones. Branchiostegals 6. Dorsal fins 2, 

 folding in a deep sheath; the first with 8 very long filamentous spines; 

 the second low, long ; anal fin low and oblong, shorter than the second 

 dorsal and with 1 slender spine, which is attached to the soft rays by 

 membrane for its whole length ; caudal fin forked and acutely lobed ; 

 pectoral fins long, acuminate ; ventral fins large, inserted under the bases 

 of the pectorals ; each with a long, slender, compressed spine contiguous 

 to the first ray, and with 5 rays, the internal of which is compound, and 

 has several contiguous branches nearly or quite distinct, thus appearing 

 like several rays. A single species known, a large, showily colored fish, 

 found on the Pacific coasts of tropical America. The group is closely 

 related to the Carangidce, especially to Seriola. It is, however, well distin- 

 guished by the peculiar development of its anal and dorsal spines and by 

 the structure of its ventral fins. (Nematistioidw, Gill, Proc. Ac. Nat. Sci- 

 Phila., 1863.) 



*0ne very large specimen was seen by Jordan & Gilbert in 1880, off Anacapa Island; another 

 taken off Santa Rosa Island, was exhibited at the San Francisco Midwinter Fair in 1894; another 

 seen near Cerros Island by Thos. C. Williams, December, 1894. 



